Texas Windmillers

October 18, 2012

Why Lubbock? Well it’s near the epicenter of America’s sunsetting fossil fuel industry, and on the cutting edge of the renewable revolution. I took an eye opening bus tour of Duke Energy’s Notrees Windpower station a couple of hours away. Before that, however, we had an early morning presentation with one of a dying breed of Texas Windmillers – the pastoral polymaths who build, rebuild, repair, install, and otherwise support the signature plains windmills, which made life possible for ranchers and settlers in an otherwise arid land, by making the water of the Ogallala Aquifer available for cattle.

And, yes, his name was Dusty.

More on this, and the Notrees (get it?) tour later. The installation is significant for a cutting edge advanced lead-acid power storage installation, in which we got a quick look.

Below, my interviews with Dr. Hayhoe who famously drafted a chapter on climate for a book by Newt Gingrich, which he rejected after going TeaParty insane – and my interview with Denialist Marc Morano, who said we should thank him for his intimidation tactic of posting Dr. Hayhoe and other scientist’s email addresses on the web, and implicitly inviting his audience to heap threats and abuse on them.